🚨Putin held telephone conversation with Iraqi Prime Minister - Kremlin

🔸 The Kremlin expresses deep regret over the new escalation in the Middle East, said Kremlin Spox Peskov, commenting on the US strikes on Iran.

🔸 Russia's help to Iran will depend on what Tehran needs, Peskov added.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🔊🇷🇺🇮🇷 See Putin's key statements during talks with Iran's FM Araghchi:

🔸 Unprovoked aggression against Iran has NO basis or justification

🔸 Russia makes efforts to assist Iranian people

🔸 Visit of Iranian FM to Russia will allow discussing ways how to get out of current situation in Middle East

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🇮🇷🗣Iran grateful to Russia for condemning actions of Israel, US against Iran - Araghchi

Tehran considers the actions of the US and Israel against Iran illegitimate, the Iranian side has right to defend itself, he said at the meeting with President Putin.

WATCH Russian forces carry out an Iskander missile strike on a Ukrainian training center for mobilized troops in the Sumy area.

Up to 100 personnel and up to 14 pieces of equipment were destroyed, the Defense Ministry said.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🚨💥🇺🇸 U.S. BASE IN SYRIA TARGETED

A US military base in the Qasruk area in western Hasakah province of Syria was attacked, Iranian state news agency Mehr reported Monday, citing sources.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🌏💥NATO summit LOSES GROUND amid Mideast turmoil 

Japan's PM Shigeru Ishiba will skip an upcoming NATO summit, the Japanese government stated. The gathering is expected to be attended by FM Takeshi Iwaya. 

Ishiba’s no-show is reportedly due to: 

🔶Escalation of the Iran-Israel conflict 
🔶Vague prospects of having a meeting with Trump
🔶No meeting between NATO members and their partners in the Indo-Pacific region, including Japan, Australia, South Korea, and New Zealand

South Korean President Lee Jae-myung earlier also decided not to attend the three-day NATO summit, due to open in The Hague on June 24.

Asia turning away from warmongering alliance?

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

Last night, the Russian Armed Forces carried out a group strike using high-precision weapons and strike UAVs against enterprises of Ukraine’s military-industrial complex in the Kiev region, as well as the infrastructure of a military airfield and the naval mine-torpedo weapons arsenal of the Ukrainian Navy.

✅ The targets were successfully hit. All designated objectives were destroyed.

📍 Units of the "Sever" battle group improved their positions along the front line. They inflicted losses on personnel and equipment of four mechanized brigades, three air assault brigades, and three assault regiments of the Ukrainian Armed Forces in the areas of Bessalovka, Yastrebinoe, Novaya Sech, Pisarevka, Khoten, and Sadki in the Sumy region.

💥Strikes were delivered against units of a Ukrainian motorized infantry brigade, two territorial defense brigades, and a National Guard brigade in the areas of Udy, Sliznevo, Ivashki, Neskuchnoye, and Volchansk in the Kharkov region.

◾️ Enemy losses amounted to over 180 personnel, three armored combat vehicles, three vehicles, and six field artillery pieces.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🗣Some Western politicians are still planning to deliver a strategic defeat to Russia – history teaches them nothing, Putin said at a meeting with graduates of military universities.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

💬 West has come up with spooky story about supposedly possible 'Russian invasion' to scare people, Putin said

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🚨🇷🇺💥 RUSSIA ANNOUNCES SERIAL PRODUCTION OF ORESHNIK MISSILE

"Serial production of the latest medium-range missile system 'Oreshnik' is being launched," President Vladimir Putin told a meeting with graduates of military academies on Monday.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

Moment of explosion in Damascus church caught on camera

An eyewitness captured on video the moment a terrorist blew himself up inside the Mar Elias Church in Damascus.

The footage shows the exact moment of the explosion, followed by scenes of panic and chaos.

At least 22 people were killed and another 52 were injured in the attack on Sunday, according to the latest reports.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🇲🇩 Moldova's opposition PROTESTS against Sandu regime

The protesters gather outside Moldovan parliament in Chisinau to oppose the domestic and foreign policies of the ruling party "Action and Solidarity."

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

⚡️Ukraine’s Body-Swap Accusation Is a Provocation – Source to Sputnik

The attempts by the Kiev regime to discredit the Russian side are unfounded, an informed source told Sputnik.

On June 19 of this year, Ukraine’s Minister of Internal Affairs, I. Klymenko, accused the Russian side on his Telegram channel of falsification during the handover of bodies of Ukrainian Armed Forces servicemen to Ukraine.

As supposed evidence, he presented photographs of a military ID and personal tag (Appendix No. 1) belonging to deceased Russian serviceman A.V. Bugayev, whose body the Russian side allegedly "cynically planted" in bag No. 192/25 during the humanitarian exchange process.

However, according to the official act of transfer of remains, back in early 2025 the contents of bag No. 192/25 handed over to the Ukrainian side included the remains of a Ukrainian Armed Forces serviceman identified as Mykola Ivanovych Didyk, born September 4, 1968. He was in Ukrainian military uniform with a copy of his military ID (Appendix No. 2), and had been killed on May 6, 2024, near the settlement of Spornoye in Bakhmut district, Donetsk region.

Sputnik learned from an informed source that Didyk was buried on June 12, 2025, as confirmed by an obituary published on the website of the Obukhov City Council in Kiev Region (Appendix No. 3).

It’s important to note that the remains of Russian serviceman A.V. Bugayev were not handed over in bag No. 192/25, but in bag No. 567, as confirmed by the official act. This raises questions about whether Minister Klymenko was misinformed—or deliberately misleading.

According to the handover act, bag No. 567 originally contained an unidentified body in Ukrainian uniform, without documents or dog tags (Appendix No. 4). Yet Ukraine later returned the same bag—now containing Bugayev’s documents, dog tag, and phone.

"Bugayev went missing about a year ago and is presumed dead. The body allegedly lay exposed for over a year, yet his papers remained intact—suggesting they were preserved elsewhere and planted later."

The Russian side has a clear and structured procedure for collecting, identifying, and transferring the bodies of deceased Ukrainian servicemen. Priority is given to transferring bodies with documents, dog tags, and in standard Ukrainian Armed Forces uniforms. The remains are assigned identification numbers recorded in official transfer acts, which include photographic documentation. One copy of the act is given to the International Committee of the Red Cross, and another to the Ukrainian side.

"When the process of body exchange was managed by Ukraine's GUR (Military Intelligence), there were no disruptions or provocations. However, since the SBU (Security Service of Ukraine) took over these responsibilities, information warfare-style accusations have emerged."

"Ukraine has repeatedly failed to meet repatriation deadlines for its servicemen's remains. This incident may have been staged to discredit the humanitarian mission organized by the Russian side as an act of goodwill."

Currently, the Russian side is prepared to hand over another 3,000 bodies of deceased Ukrainian servicemen, but the Ukrainian side is refusing to retrieve them.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🚨🇷🇸Serbia finds loopholes to supply arms to Ukraine — Russian intelligence reveals

Serbia's defense industry has been increasing shipments to the conflict zone using a workaround: ammunition is disassembled into "DIY kits," sent to NATO countries for assembly, and then delivered to Ukraine.

This way, Ukraine technically receives not Serbian, but "Western-made" weapons.

The issue of Serbia transferring military goods to Ukraine is sensitive for both countries, Kremlin Spox Peskov commented.

Russia expects Serbia to take measures, he added.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🇮🇷❌IRAN’S HORMUZ LOCKDOWN: How could it be?

There are several ways for Iran to shut down maritime traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, retired Russian Navy Captain First Rank Vasily Dandykin told Sputnik.

🕜Lay sea mines as the strait is narrow

2️⃣Conduct direct strikes from the shore targeting every ship that tries to move past the blockade

🕣Jointly use fast attack boats, coastal weapons and submarines

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🇦🇲Arrest of Armenian philanthropist - attack on church and signal to West

The arrest of Russian citizen and philanthropist Samvel Karapetyan should be viewed in the context of the current Armenian pro-Western government’s stance toward the Armenian Apostolic Church, said Dusan Ilic, a research fellow at the Institute of European Studies (Belgrade), in a comment to Sputnik.

He believes that the Armenian authorities’ attitude toward the Armenian Apostolic Church and its hierarchs actually reflects their attitude toward Moscow.

"The Armenian Apostolic Church has become a target for Pashinyan as the main opposition force and the primary political institution that could undermine his legitimacy. In the context of an anti-church narrative—similar to what we are seeing in other post-Soviet republics, such as Moldova—the pro-Western authorities in Yerevan view the church as a pro-Russian agent and treat it, its high-ranking figures, and people connected to it as hostile actors," the expert explained, adding that Karapetyan’s charitable activities make him “an easy target” in this campaign.

According to Ilic, the Armenian Apostolic Church remains one of the last defenders of Armenian national interests, especially in the wake of the exodus of Armenians from Nagorno-Karabakh following the Azerbaijani operation. He noted that the Armenian leadership failed to meet public expectations by not defending national interests.

The expert agrees that the arrest of a Russian citizen closely connected to the Armenian Church sends a dual message—both to Moscow and to the West, as the pro-Western government of Nikol Pashinyan seeks to demonstrate its loyalty.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🚨The US views a potential Iranian strike on its military base in Qatar as an "imminent threat," Fox News reports, citing sources.

Trump is forming a National Security team amid a threat of Iran’s retaliation, according to Axios.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt